It was only two years into his career as a video content Director and Producer, that Filmmaker Harbaksh Sahi, famously known as Sago, worked on a staggering 150 projects in a single year (yes, our reaction exactly!), working with various artists and brands in multiple industries, including music, fashion and beauty, comedy, travel and tourism, and more.
When asked how he pulled off such a feat, Sago joked, “Looking back at that year now, it does sound crazy how many projects we did. I just remember there were quite a few Red Bulls involved!”
With the number of projects he was getting and the international array of brands and artists he was working with so early on into his career, Sago found it both exciting and overwhelming. One might ask, what sort of energy would it need to take on a hundred and fifty projects in a single year. We’re about to take a look at what the year looked like for filmmaker Harbaksh Sahi.
Being a Director and Producer is more than a job; it’s a passion. It is highly satisfying to be able to bring a story or a vision to life through the media of cinema and video. It is not enough for a director or a producer to be creative by themselves, they are also responsible for managing a team of creative individuals, all of whom must contribute their best work to a project to ensure its success. It is a daring yet joyful experience to create something that can trigger emotions, convey a story, or entertain an audience. Whether a film, a music video, or a commercial, the end product results from consistent meticulous work, and devotion, and it’s an incredible feeling to see it come to life.
We’re digging into the work of one such filmmaker, one who has perhaps been more active in the scene than most would imagine at his stage, but try as we might, we’ll only be scraping the surface.
Harbaksh Sahi, now popularly known as Sago, always knew he wanted to be a director and producer of film and video, and build his own film and video studio. However, his first source of income was actually from his other passion: music.
Sago began performing publicly at the age of 15, performing acoustic sets with his guitar at venues like malls, and eventually playing the piano at upscale events and expos. Talking about his origins and learning the guitar, Sago recalls obsessively listening to the music of iconic guitarist Stephane Wrembel, and trying to learn Wrembel’s Bistro Fada, from the Grammy Winning album of the Oscar Winning film Midnight in Paris.
“So the fact that, a few years later, when I started my career as a filmmaker, one of the first big projects I got called to direct was a Stephane Wrembel concert film, you can imagine how I felt!” Sago tells us. “It made me realize a thing or two about how events in our lives often play out.”
The gigs Sago performed as a musician in his teens eventually set the foundation for him to start his professional career as a filmmaker, not only in allowing him to save some money and buy
himself some gear, but also in giving him opportunities to network and improve his communication and negotiation skills when talking to adults in various industries.
Around 2015 was when Sago officially began his career directing video content for other artists, and once the first few projects that he directed went online, new opportunities would line up one after another, eventually leading him to founding his video production studio, Glowworm Collective.
While his first year mostly involved working with local independent artists and bands, usually working for very low budgets and sometimes even for free, the jump in projects in his second year was momentous.
He not only expanded nationally, but also grew internationally, working with American artists, such as (Grammy nominated) Beth Hart, and Karsh Kale; Canadian artist Malika Tirolien (of Grammy winning Snarky Puppy album Family Dinner – Volume 1 fame); Indian artists, such as Prateek Kuhad, Parekh & Singh, Siddharth Basrur, Lost Stories, Mame Khan, Divine; Japanese artist Goth-Trad; Swiss artist Milo Häfliger; German artists Django 3000 (in association with the German Embassy), and DaDaDisco; French artists Ti Rat & Rouge Reggae; and Bosnian artists Dubioza Kolketiv, among others.
“It’s like I swam out of a pool and into the sea!”
He also worked on creating Official Aftermovies for various concerts and music festivals, including Vh1 Supersonic, Bass Camp Festival, and a concert tour featuring American band Crown The Empire.
Music video content wasn’t the only industry that Sago was working in with artists from around the globe, though; he also got to produce and direct video content for brands from countries such as the US, India, France, and the UK, brands including ELLE, Bobbi Brown, Vertex Effects, Smirnoff, Bacardi, Harman, the Total Environment Music Foundation, Lakmé, Femina, Impresario, Social, antiSocial, Vallonne, and Netflix, to name a few.
“Yeah, the Netflix one was a pretty neat gig!”
How exactly did he get these big name projects one after the other?
“I want to say social media, but honestly, I was pretty bad at keeping social media active. The truth is mostly word-of-mouth – people I worked with would recommend me to other people looking for video content; and networking – I was saying yes to practically every project I got, even though some of them weren’t that interesting or didn’t pay that well, because there’s always a chance that I’d meet someone there, and then they would call me for another project where I’d meet someone else, and they would ask if I have some work I can share with them, which I would, and then that would lead to a bigger project, which is pretty much how it happened most of the time. And then the other thing was that some of these videos early on were getting a lot of views on YouTube, over a million on some of them, and my name and info would be mentioned in the credits as director/producer. So people would reach out asking for similar content for their own projects.”
The biggest new accomplishments for Sago that year, as a filmmaker, were quite distinctly that he took his first steps into the world of TV, creating promo content for Netflix’s Marvel series Iron Fist, and also getting to direct on Commercials.
He worked on a commercial for Mastercard, and though he only directed on the 2nd Unit team, he had the opportunity to direct multi-award-winning actor Anil Kapoor (of Oscar-winning film Slumdog Millionaire, and Mission Impossible fame), quite surely a watershed moment for the filmmaker, again, barely two years into his career.
“It was just one scene in the commercial that I was directing Mr. Kapoor for, but it was quite an unbelievable moment nonetheless. Walking into his vanity van to discuss the upcoming scene, I kept calm, cool, and professional on the outside, of course, but honestly, the only thing I could think of in that moment was if someone from the behind-the-scenes crew was getting footage of this!”
In spite of taking these new steps into the world of TV and Commercials, Sago’s momentum in directing and producing content for digital platforms like YouTube didn’t slow down. Many of his new projects continued to take their place in the “Million-Views Club,” as they did in the previous year.
“I think, among all this constant work happening, the most interesting part of that year was the traveling. There was quite a bit of traveling involved, as you might imagine.”
Sago went on tour with some of the most renowned stand-up comics in the scene, creating and filming video content for their Amazon and Netflix specials.
This was in addition to the countless other comics he worked with on a local level.
He also got to produce and direct a series of travel and culture-based videos in various countries like India, Thailand, Nepal and the UK.
“These were probably the most fun! Did I say that about another project already? Because I take that back, these were definitely the most fun! This was a travel series of sorts; each of these was sponsored by different brands, and we traveled to each country to explore a specific niche. So, for example, we went to Bangkok, Thailand, exploring the nightlife, underground shows, and party scenes. I’m not sure if I should name the brands that were sponsoring these travels, but they were in that specific niche. Like one of the sponsors for the Thailand trip was a dating app, I guess I can give out that much! Then we traveled to Pokhara, Nepal, and explored the adventure sports scene there. This trip was sponsored by a sports clothing brand and a few adventure sports companies. In the UK, we explored the independent comedy scene. So these were great experiences, and I was directing popular television personalities and influencers, while also getting to work with more brands. Very unique experiences, each of those adventures! Also, traveling for free is so much more satisfying than paying and traveling, no? When I spend money to travel somewhere now, it doesn’t feel the same as when it’s brand-sponsored [laughs]!”
Cutting to more recent times, Sago continues to work on demanding projects with renowned global talent. As of more recently, he has directed and produced official video content for Willow Smith, in association with Universal Music Group, MSFTSMusic, and Roc Nation Records, and British artist Jahnavi Harrison.
This year, he also collaborated with Studio AllThat, and the Korean Cultural Center New York, and directed and produced official video content with popular Korean bands Jannabi and byebyesea, in association with Lincoln Center, in New York City, where Sago is currently based. “That was probably my favorite project from this year. High energy, really good artists, and really good companies to collaborate with. I’m now trying to create more content with a diverse range of artists and brands here in New York City.”
Getting this busy with his professional work as a filmmaker, Sago did, however, start to lose touch with his other passion, music, over the years. That was until 2020, when the world shut down, and the Covid lockdowns gave him much more time in his room than any time before. With not many film and video productions taking place during the Spring and Summer months of 2020, Sago stayed productive, recording demos of some of his original music, in his bedroom, with no real professional recording gear, and posting them to YouTube, “just to keep the creative juices flowing.”
As it turned out, the “view count bug” from his many years of creating video content for clients stuck by him, as his bedroom demos ended up receiving over 40000 views in total. Soon enough, a New York-based music producer reached out to him, and the two are currently working on a series of projects together.
This new connection, though made during a tough time of global lockdowns and anxious uncertainties, has now led to many more music videos and film projects lined up for Sago, in his current home city of New York, some in collaboration with renowned producer Anthony Argento, with quite a few projects bringing on Sago as a Director, and possibly a Producer, in the coming few years.
“Maybe just not a hundred and fifty projects in a single year this time!” Sago confirms. “I’ll stick with a healthier amount, I suppose! Let’s see.”
